'05 Z-71 front inner tire wear help

[hikerboy]

My 2005 Z-71 4x4 Sierra has some significant inner tire wear on the front drivers side - - I had it aligned several months ago at the GMC dealer, who said everything checked out OK. Got the printout from the alignment and everything showed "within spec", toe, camber, and caster. Hmm.... strange. Truck is bone stock,tires are LT/LR C Goodyear Wrangler Silent Armors with about 50K miles, truck has 90K miles. Original owner, lubed/oil changes regularly since new. Before I take it to my local Les Schwab for the investigation, what could cause this? I suppose everything from ball joints to tie rods? Shocks are new as of a couple of years ago.

 

Thanks for the advice!

 

[Motor City Rick]

It's either "negative camber" or "toe out". It could be a combination of both affecting that tire. You might not find any driveability issues with this condition. I found numerous front end racks are out of calibration. Most dealers / garages will not spend the money to check calibration yearly. Ask for proof of recent calibration the next time you have a front end done. If they can't prove it hasn't be calibrated with a year, ...move on. Please post specs what they gave you if possible.

 

The specs as follows:

 

2005 Chevrolet Silverado 1500 Z71 4x4

Left Caster 3.8 Degrees +-1
Right Caster 4.1 Degrees +-1

Camber .25 Degrees +-.5

Toe-In .05 Inches +-.10

The actual numbers is what you go for, anything near the outer limits is a waste of alignment money.

[007matman]

Ball joints or an alignment issue. TRE's would be in there too.. if you want to find out jack it up off the ground and put your hands at 6 and 12 and try to rock up and down. If you feel anything (a knock or lose movement) there it's probably your ball joints.

 

If you then put your hands at 3 and 9 and again try to rock it back and forth. Any movement there would likely indicate bad TRE's.

 

If no movement then I'd blame the alignment. There is probably too much toe-in present on that wheel.

 

Is the side edge of the tire cupped at all? You might feel it if you rub your hand over it.

 

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It's either "negative camber" or "toe out". It could be a combination of both affecting that tire. You might not find any driveability issues with this condition. I found numerous front end racks are out of calibration. Most dealers / garages will not spend the money to check calibration yearly. Ask for proof of recent calibration the next time you have a front end done. If they can't prove it hasn't be calibrated with a year, ...move on. Please post specs what they gave you if possible.

 

The specs as follows:

 

2005 Chevrolet Silverado 1500 Z71 4x4

 

Left Caster 3.8 Degrees +-1

Right Caster 4.1 Degrees +-1

 

Camber .25 Degrees +-.5

 

Toe-In .05 Inches +-.10

The actual numbers is what you go for, anything near the outer limits is a waste of alignment money.

Or what he said.. :-)

 

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[hikerboy]

Here's the printout from the GM Dealer.

 

Tire doesn't feel cupped/feathered. Truck seems to track well, doesn't pull to one side or the other.

[Motor City Rick]

ANY worn parts will show up on a complete alignment procedure, but a through front end inspection is warranted "first" before doing any alignment.

 

007 Matman is on point with the first proper step. I'll bet you the dealership kid figured to align a 4 wheel drive will be too labor intensive, so he "fudge" the numbers to make a quick buck.

 

Caster is out of specs, but castor doesn't wear the tires, it's more of a handling issue. Also, when doing an alignment, the best non-worn tires go on the front axle with proper inflation then do the alignment. Or after a new set of tires, you do the alignment then. I downloaded your jpeg, studied the data, if you look in each green box, look at the arrow position, notice how each arrow is "not" pointing near the middle "nominal" line, especially castor??? A good alignment specialist goes for the nominal mark that is dead center. This guy didn't do jack chit. Find the best alignment shop in your county and stay away from this rip off.

[bubbanbrenda]

There is a huge difference between "within spec" and correct. My first question would be why that print out was printed at 3:23 am. Just my $0.02.

[hikerboy]

Alignment completed....wow, truck seems to track much better than it did, even though it seemed OK prior. Just feels more solid and tight in the steering. All suspension components were OK. The tech at Les Schwab Tire Center said the camber was way off, as was the caster, and the RH toe. Now I know that the GM dealer didn't do squat, or his alignment rack was not calibrated, or who knows what...but all seems good now. Thanks all for the suggestions, here's the new printout.

[sdeeter19555]

I would take that to your "dealer" and ask them why they charged you for an alignment they obviously didn't complete.

 

I wouldn't ask for money-back, I'd just make them aware that you know they didn't do what you paid for...I would also consider mentioni g this to the BBB.

 

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[Motor City Rick]

If I did this alignment after the tire center, I would dramatically improve the camber (tire wear factor) and castor (steering direction) settings. Look at where the black arrow setting are after the alignment. They are not even close to the center point (nominal) specs on the sheet. I'm glad you got an improvement, but still far from what it could be. What happened in taking pride in doing an accurate repair job???

[Wires]

If you look at the graphs, they have a couple of stepped areas (arrows are within the center steps). It is normal to add positive camber to the fronts to aid in steering response, and negaive camber to the rears for better traction when cornering. I see what you are saying, but shooting for a "0" in each box doesn't give optimum driving experience.

[Motor City Rick]

The hard stuff is being avoided, the easy stuff was done.

 

Why do 80% of a job when you can shoot for 100%??? End result, hikeboy has tire wear and commented on driving improvement with updated adjustments.

 

The worn tires aid in a worse driving experience excluding the alignment.

 

Another factoid, when trucks come down the assembly line, they are aligned with full load consideration, not the stock factory weight so the trucks don't drive squirrely down the road under full load condition.